NewsFlash

This one is a few days old, but I've seen the information multiple places - most of them legitimate.

Signs U.S. Massing B-2 Spirit Bombers In Diego Garcia

A significant force of B-2 Spirit stealth bombers looks to be currently wending its way to the Indian Ocean island of Diego Garcia. Satellite imagery shows at least three C-17 cargo planes and 10 aerial refueling tankers forward-deployed in the last 48 hours to the highly strategic British territory, which has been used as a staging point for U.S. strikes in the Middle East on multiple occasions in the past. The build-up comes amid a new surge in U.S. strikes targeting the Houthis and growing warnings to Iran from the Trump administration over support for the Yemeni militants and Tehran’s nuclear ambitions.


MORE at https://www.yahoo.com/news/signs-u-massing-b-2-204402400.html

SEE ALSO

https://militarywatchmagazine.com/article/us-air-force-masses-large-b2-fleet-diego-garcia-yemen

https://www.newsmax.com/newsfront/us-bombers-b2/2025/03/26/id/1204486/



[Somebody's about to.... God help them.]

Trump Administration Mistakenly Sent Maryland Man to El Salvador Prison, Says it Can't Get Him Back - The Trump administration conceded in a court filing Monday that it mistakenly deported a Maryland father to El Salvador “because of an administrative error” and argued it could not return him because he’s now in Salvadoran custody.

FROM -  https://www.yahoo.com/news/trump-administration-concedes-maryland-father-044632677.html


The United States government accidentally deported a man to El Salvador due to an "administrative error," landing him in a notorious mega-jail and leaving him stuck there in legal limbo, according to legal papers filed on Monday. Kilmar Arbrego Garcia came to the U.S. in 2011 from El Salvador and is a legal resident protected by a 2019 court order that prevented him from being sent back to his home country. But, in court papers filed Monday, the government admitted that "on March 15, although ICE was aware of his protection from removal to El Salvador, Abrego Garcia was removed to El Salvador because of an administrative error." Garcia lives in Maryland with his wife and 5-year-old child, who is autistic and intellectually disabled. The couple both work full-time, the filing says. This incident was first reported by The Atlantic. ...

...On March 12, after finishing his shift as a sheet metal worker and picking up his child, Garcia was pulled over and arrested by Homeland Security agents, with one of them telling him his "status has changed," a lawsuit calling for his release from last week shows. ICE officers allegedly told him that his wife had to collect the couple's child within 10 minutes or he would be handed over to Child Protective Services, the filing says. She arrived and found Garcia "confused, distraught and crying," but she received no explanation for his arrest, the filing says. Garcia was interviewed and repeatedly asked about gang affiliations but told his wife that he was due to appear before an immigration judge and expected to be released. He then called her from a detention center in Texas, telling her he was about to be deported, the filing says. Garcia's lawsuit accuses the Department of Homeland Security, ICE, and several cabinet members named as defendants of deciding to deport him without following the law, in full knowledge that "El Salvador tortures individuals detained in CECOT."

FROM - https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/man-was-sent-el-salvador-due-administrative-error-protected-legal-stat-rcna199010


The Trump administration has mistakenly deported Kilmar Armando Abrego Garcia, a Salvadoran immigrant with protected status in the US, to El Salvador's CECOT prison. The US government admits the deportation was an administrative error, despite Mr Abrego Garcia having protection from removal due to fears of persecution in El Salvador. Mr Abrego Garcia's family has filed a lawsuit demanding his return, but the administration argues the US court lacks jurisdiction since he is no longer in US custody. The father and union worker had been living in the US for about 14 years after fleeing gang violence in El Salvador. ICE accused him of gang affiliation, a claim his lawyers dispute. This incident follows the deportation of hundreds of Venezuelans to El Salvador, some seemingly based on common tattoos, raising concerns about due process and the administration's use of emergency powers.

FROM - https://www.msn.com/en-gb/news/world/us-mistakenly-deports-man-to-mega-prison-and-can-t-get-him-back/ar-AA1C34jz


U.S. Tied Migrants to Gang Based Largely on Clothes or Tattoos, Papers Show - The court papers suggest that the administration has set a low bar for seeking the removal of the Venezuelan migrants, whom officials have described as belonging to the street gang, Tren de Aragua.The Trump administration has granted itself the authority to summarily deport Venezuelan migrants accused of being members of a violent street gang on the basis of little more than whether they have tattoos or have worn clothing associated with the criminal organization, new court papers show.

FROM - https://www.nytimes.com/2025/03/31/us/politics/us-deportations-tren-de-aragua-deportation-guidance.html


SEE ALSO -

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/trump-admin-accidentally-sent-maryland-father-to-salvadorian-mega-prison-and-says-it-can-t-get-him-back/ar-AA1C2JpF

https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2025/03/an-administrative-error-sends-a-man-to-a-salvadoran-prison/682254/


[WELL THEY HAD DAMNED WELL BETTER GET HIM BACK!         ]


[ Leviticus 19:33-34 ]

Trump Administration Halts Funding for Legal Representation of Migrant Children - ABC News has reported on how thousands of unaccompanied children are representing themselves in immigration court due to a shortage of attorneys. In 2023, only 56% of unaccompanied minors in immigration courts were represented by counsel, according to data from the Department of Justice. ... Michael Lukens, the executive director for the Amica Center, which represents migrant children in the Washington, D.C., area, called the halting of funding "unlawful." "It is particularly cruel to make children go to court alone, and it is a continuing expansion of Trump's war against immigrants," Lukens said. "And it's sad that we're now at a point where he has set his sights on children."

FROM  https://abcnews.go.com/US/trump-administration-halts-funding-legal-aid-migrant-children/story?id=120033078


In Oklahoma, Counting Migrant Students May Have Gone Too Far - A divide between Oklahoma’s governor and schools chief over undocumented students may mark the outer limits of acceptable immigration enforcement, or the next frontier.  Oklahoma’s conservative Republican governor, Kevin Stitt, and its conservative Republican schools superintendent have appeared to stand shoulder-to-shoulder in the years of Donald J. Trump, with the former sending Oklahoma guardsmen to the southern border and the latter stocking the state’s schools with Trump-branded Bibles. But when the superintendent, Ryan Walters, proposed finding the undocumented students in Oklahoma’s schools, Mr. Stitt said enough is enough. “When I saw them picking on kids, I thought that’s a step too far,” Mr. Stitt said in a recent interview in his office in the State Capitol....The governor said he did not object to enforcing immigration law but worried that undocumented parents would potentially keep their children home, rather than be forced to disclose their immigration status. “The kids didn’t do anything wrong, is my point,” he said.

FROM - https://www.nytimes.com/2025/03/28/us/oklahoma-republican-fight.html

Alabama can’t prosecute groups who help women travel to get an abortion, federal judge says

MONTGOMERY, Ala, (AP) — Alabama’s attorney general cannot prosecute people and groups who help Alabama women travel to other states to obtain abortions, a federal judge ruled Monday. U.S. District Judge Myron Thompson sided with an abortion fund and medical providers who sued Alabama Attorney General Steve Marshall after he suggested they could face prosecution under anti-conspiracy laws. Thompson’s ruling declared that such prosecutions would violate both the First Amendment and a person’s right to travel.

Marshall has not pursued any such prosecutions. However, he said he would “look at closely” whether facilitating out-of-state abortions is a violation of Alabama’s criminal conspiracy laws. The ruling was a victory for Yellowhammer Fund, an abortion assistance fund that had paused providing financial assistance to low-income people in the state because of the possibility of prosecution. Alabama bans abortion at any stage of pregnancy with no exceptions for rape and incest.

“It is one thing for Alabama to outlaw by statute what happens in its own backyard. It is another thing for the state to enforce its values and laws, as chosen by the attorney general, outside its boundaries by punishing its citizens and others who help individuals travel to another state to engage in conduct that is lawful there but the attorney general finds to be contrary to Alabama’s values and laws,′ Thompson wrote in the 131-page opinion.

FROM - https://kstp.com/world/alabama-cant-prosecute-groups-who-help-women-travel-to-get-an-abortion-federal-judge-says/

Tech billionaire and senior Trump adviser Elon Musk appeared to boast of advance knowledge of a planned arrest related to alleged Social Security fraud during an appearance on a live stream Monday night promoted to his more than 200 million social media followers, frustrating top law enforcement officials, multiple sources told ABC News.  "Yes. In fact, I believe someone is going to be arrested tomorrow," Musk said in response to a question about whether U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi would prosecute fraud found within the Social Security system. Musk made the comments during a live streamed tele-rally in support of conservative Wisconsin Supreme Court candidate Brad Schimel. Musk, discussing the alleged planned arrest, said, "This is someone who actually stole 400,000 social security numbers and personal information from the Social Security database, and was selling social security numbers and all of all the identification information in order for people to basically steal money from Social Security."

Musk did not say how he came to know about the alleged planned arrest, but sources familiar with the matter told ABC News that Musk was referring to an ongoing federal investigation, and that his public disclosure of the matter disturbed top law enforcement officials with knowledge of the probe. Previewing an arrest before it takes place would conflict with standard practice intended to protect potentially sensitive law enforcement operations and those involved in carrying them out. A spokesperson for the Justice Department did not immediately respond to ABC News' request for comment.


FROM - https://www.yahoo.com/news/elon-musks-disclosure-planned-social-190423197.html

RFK Jr. exiles top federal health leaders, including Fauci's replacement

Top federal health leaders across the Department of Health and Human Services were effectively ousted Tuesday from their posts, with many reassigned to positions at the Indian Health Service, or IHS, as part of a sweeping restructuring ordered by Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.  Senior leaders at multiple agencies were removed, multiple health officials said, including Dr. Jeanne Marrazzo. Marrazzo replaced Dr. Anthony Fauci as the head of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases. At the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, senior officials put on leave and reassigned to the Indian Health Service include Dr. Karen Hacker, head of the agency's chronic disease teams, Kayla Laserson, head of its global health center and Dr. Jonathan Mermin, director of the CDC's STD and HIV/AIDS center....

...A top-ranking official at another HHS agency was also reassigned, one official familiar with the move said. All the other options they were given would have involved relocating, the official said they were told. Another official said that senior leaders in their team had been offered reassignment to remote locations several states away, one official said [sic]. At the Food and Drug Administration, one official had been told that refusing the reassignment would result in them losing their severance pay. "How insulting to IHS and the center directors. The IHS sites fill critical gaps, they aren't an American Gulag Archipelago," one CDC official said. Other top officials effectively ousted Tuesday include Dr. John Howard, head of the National Institute of Occupational Safety and Health, and Dr. Brian King, the top regulator of tobacco products at the Food and Drug Administration, current and former officials said.....

... at the CDC, multiple teams were gutted by the layoffs, according to a list circulated among agency officials, including the Division of Reproductive Health, Division of Population Health and Office of Smoking and Health. Under Mermin's STD and HIV/AIDS center, tuberculosis elimination and studies branches were cut. It comes after several top officials have already resigned or been forced out at federal health agencies, including the FDA's top vaccines official Dr. Peter Marks last week and the agency's top food safety and nutrition official earlier this year. More resignations or cuts are expected in the coming weeks, officials said, as leaders at the agencies wrestle with the chaos caused by the cuts.

Many agency leaders said they had been left in the dark about the cuts, asking staff to let them know whether they had received reduction-in-force notices Tuesday.

From - https://www.cbsnews.com/news/hhs-rif-cdc-fda-niaid-federal-health-leaders-leave-reassigned/

SEE ALSO:

The top veterinarians overseeing the bird flu response at the Food and Drug Administration's Center for Veterinary Medicine were laid off on Tuesday, as part of sweeping cuts ordered by Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to the nation's health agencies. Out of some 10,000 workers laid off Tuesday across the Department of Health and Human Services, more than 130 staff were cut in the FDA's veterinary center, multiple officials said. The center oversees medicines and food given in the U.S. to animals, ranging from pets to cattle. Officials said cuts impacted virtually all of the leadership team in the Center for Veterinary Medicine's office of the director, except for the director herself, Tracey Forfa. Management and administrative teams were also gutted at CVM, including communications and purchasing staff, officials said, similar to other centers within the FDA. "The food compliance officers and animal drug reviewers survived, but they have no one at the comms office to put out a safety alert, no admin staff to pay external labs to test products," one FDA official said, who was not authorized to speak publicly.

FROM https://www.cbsnews.com/news/fda-lays-off-bird-flu-leadership-among-steep-cuts-to-senior-veterinarians/



[To reiterate - we are SO screwed.        ]

Corey Booker has been speaking for over 20 hours straight, now.

Watch Live: Sen. Cory Booker delivering marathon speech on Senate floor to protest President Trump policies- Democratic Sen. Cory Booker is delivering a marathon speech on the Senate floor, which started Monday evening and has continued into Tuesday, in a protest of the Trump administration's policies.

https://www.news9.com/story/67ebf6d9597ac14c73d4185f/sen-cory-booker-delivers-marathon-speech-to-protest-president-trump-policies

Trump Administration Halts Funding for Legal Representation of Migrant Children - ABC News has reported on how thousands of unaccompanied children are representing themselves in immigration court due to a shortage of attorneys. In 2023, only 56% of unaccompanied minors in immigration courts were represented by counsel, according to data from the Department of Justice. ... Michael Lukens, the executive director for the Amica Center, which represents migrant children in the Washington, D.C., area, called the halting of funding "unlawful." "It is particularly cruel to make children go to court alone, and it is a continuing expansion of Trump's war against immigrants," Lukens said. "And it's sad that we're now at a point where he has set his sights on children."

FROM  https://abcnews.go.com/US/trump-administration-halts-funding-legal-aid-migrant-children/story?id=120033078
....

  Judge orders Trump administration to restore legal aid to unaccompanied migrant children, for now

San Francisco —  A federal judge in California on Tuesday ordered the Trump administration to temporarily restore legal aid to tens of thousands of migrant children who are in the United States without a parent or guardian. The Republican administration on March 21 terminated a contract with the Acacia Center for Justice, which provides legal services for unaccompanied migrant children under 18 through a network of legal aid groups that subcontract with the center. Eleven subcontractor groups sued, saying 26,000 children were at risk of losing their attorneys. Acacia is not a plaintiff. Those groups argued that the government has an obligation under a 2008 anti-trafficking law to provide vulnerable children with legal counsel.

U.S. District Judge Araceli Martínez-Olguín of San Francisco granted a temporary restraining order late Tuesday. She wrote that advocates raised legitimate questions about whether the administration violated the 2008 law, warranting a return to the status quo while the case continues. The order will take effect Wednesday and runs through April 16. "The Court additionally finds that the continued funding of legal representation for unaccompanied children promotes efficiency and fairness within the immigration system," she wrote. ...

The Trafficking Victims Protection Reauthorization Act of 2008 created special protections for migrant children who cannot navigate a complex immigration system on their own. Plaintiffs said some of their clients are too young to speak and others are too traumatized and do not know English. The law requires the government to ensure "to the greatest extent practicable" that all children entering the country alone have legal counsel to represent them in proceedings and to "protect them from mistreatment, exploitation, and trafficking."

FROM - https://www.cbsnews.com/news/trump-administration-unaccompanied-migrant-children-legal-aid-restoration-order/

 

President Trump’s efforts to deport migrants to places other than their country of origin hit a new roadblock on Friday, when a federal judge issued a temporary order requiring the administration to give migrants an opportunity to contest their removal on the grounds that they might be at risk of persecution or torture. U.S. District Court Judge Brian E. Murphy, who sits in Boston, ordered the government to give migrants a chance to contest their removal to a so-called third country under a federal law that limits deportations to places where the deportees’ “life or freedom would be threatened.” He also cited a United Nations treaty against torture.

...The Trump administration has struck deals with Costa Rica, Panama, Guatemala, Mexico and El Salvador as part of its efforts to remove people who are difficult to deport to their home countries. Hundreds of migrants from countries in Africa and Asia, for instance, have been deported to Panama, a country those migrants had no ties to.

...The new order is limited to migrants who have a “final order of removal,” meaning their case has already been considered by an immigration court. The administration has also claimed it has the authority to circumvent much of that process using the 1798 Alien Enemies Act, which it has used to remove more than 200 Venezuelans from the United States to El Salvador. Another judge has blocked that use of the law, which only applies during wartime....

FROM https://www.nytimes.com/2025/03/28/us/politics/trump-deportations-judge-order.html

SAN JOSE (Reuters) -Former Costa Rican President and Nobel Prize winner Oscar Arias said on Tuesday that the U.S. had revoked his visa to enter the country, weeks after he criticized U.S. President Donald Trump on social media saying he was behaving like "a Roman emperor." Arias, 84, was president between 1986 and 1990 and again between 2006 and 2010. A self-declared pacifist, he won the 1987 Nobel Peace Prize for his role in brokering peace during the Central American conflicts of the 1980s. Arias also promoted a free trade agreement with the U.S. during his last term and in 2007 established diplomatic ties with China.

"I received an email from the U.S. government informing me that they have suspended the visa I have in my passport. The communication was very terse, it does not give reasons. One could have conjectures," Arias told reporters outside his home, without elaborating on his suspicions.

FROM - https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/costa-rican-former-president-oscar-arias-says-us-revoked-his-visa/ar-AA1C6tiA



[I wonder if they're going to arrest Cat Stevens again? In case you weren't around then.... https://www.cbsnews.com/news/cat-why-was-i-banned-from-us/]

Sherrill Introduces Bill to Require Elon Musk to Pass Drug Test to Maintain Special Government Employee Status

WASHINGTON, DC — Representative Mikie Sherrill (NJ-11) introduced new legislation to force Elon Musk — who has a well-documented history of drug use — and his Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) employees to pass a drug test, and participate in random drug testing in order to retain their Special Government Employee status with the United States government. “Donald Trump has given billionaire Elon Musk the keys to our government, and with it, access to highly sensitive information — from Treasury and Social Security data to even our most guarded military plans. Those with access to sensitive information must be thoroughly vetted, clear-eyed, and exercise good judgment. Elon Musk and his DOGE employees should be held to the same standard as other executive branch employees, whether that’s for conflicts of interest or passing a drug test to maintain employment or a security clearance. “In the wake of Trump’s top national security officials sharing classified information on an unsecured Signal group chat — putting our service members’ lives at risk — it’s more important than ever to protect the American people from the Trump Administration’s reckless incompetence and blatant disregard for national security,” said Rep. Sherrill.

Typically, government officials with access to highly sensitive information are required to pass a drug test and are subject to intermittent random testing as a condition of their employment. This ensures that officials who have access to our government’s most sensitive information are following the law and cannot be blackmailed for their illegal drug use. Sherrill’s bill would require Elon Musk and other Special Government Employees like him to consistently pass these same drug tests in order to maintain access to sensitive information.

https://sherrill.house.gov/media/press-releases/sherrill-introduces-bill-to-require-elon-musk-to-pass-drug-test-to-maintain-special-government-employee-status

    

A mother and her three children were detained last month in an immigration operation in northern New York state near the U.S.-Canada border, according to an immigrant advocacy group. New York Gov. Kathy Hochul said the operation was "just plain cruel" and called on the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency to return the family to the state.  The operation and outcry from officials come as the Trump administration carries out its controversial immigration crackdown throughout the country. Federal agents carried out the New York operation last Thursday at a dairy farm in the town of Hounsfield, according to CBS affiliate WWNY-TV. The Department of Homeland Security told the news station ICE and other federal law enforcement agencies had started conducting operations in parts of New York to enforce immigration law on March 24. WWNY-TV reported eight people were detained at the farm, according to officials.

...While Hochul said that she supports working with the federal government to deport violent criminals who pose a threat, she called for the family to be returned to New York. "I cannot think of any public safety justification for ICE agents to rip an innocent family, including a child in the third grade, from their Sackets Harbor home," the governor said in a statement Tuesday. "That is not the immigration enforcement promised to the American people. It's just plain cruel. I want this family returned to New York State and believe ICE needs to immediately answer for these actions."

Hochul's statement followed outcry from local officials who also want the family back. "These kids are, they're classmates, they're good friends, they are wonderful students, and they are part of the fabric of our school community," Jennifer Gaffney, superintendent of the Sackets Harbor Central School District, told WWNY-TV in an interview broadcast Monday, "and they need to be returned to their classrooms."


https://www.cbsnews.com/news/immigration-operation-new-york-kathy-hochul/


SEE ALSO

...CBP declined to provide further details on the family’s case or current whereabouts and ICE has not responded to NCPR’s request for comment and information. NCPR wasn’t able to reach the owner of the North Harbor Dairy Farm, but Corey DeCillis, the Chairman of Jefferson County’s Democratic Committee, spoke with him over the weekend. "He explained to me how detrimental and how terrifying it was to see those kids [taken] by masked, armed Homeland Security agents and ICE agents, handcuffed and put in the van, and escorted off his farm," said DeCillis.  DeCillis says the farmer described his workers - and the children - as his family.  "And when he kept referring to these folks as his family, and that really hit home for me. I have kids. That’s not the way to treat children.".

...The President and CEO of the NY Immigration Coalition, Murad Awawdeh, said the Sackets Harbor detainment “is an affront to American values and to humanity in general. We’re supposed to live in a nation of laws.” Awawdeh said he was familiar with the family’s situation and that his organization believes they are now being held in a detention center in Texas. He said the family had an immigration case in New York and had been attending immigration check-ins and court hearings.“They were snatched by ICE agents and sent thousands of miles away from their home and their community,” he said. “Everyone in America has the right to due process, but Donald Trump and Tom Homan are acting fully outside of the law.”

Tom Homan is President Trump’s appointed Border Czar. He grew up in Jefferson County, near North Harbor Dairy.


FROM - https://www.northcountrypublicradio.org/news/story/51511/20250331/sackets-harbor-community-calls-for-return-of-three-children-taken-during-ice-dairy-farm-visit

[NOTE:  The locals are not happy about this all. There's a march that's going to end Homan's home on the 5th. ]

Minneapolis AP  —  A University of Minnesota graduate business student who’s being held by Immigration and Customs Enforcement is suing for his immediate release, saying his arrest violated his rights and he’s been given little explanation for why he’s being held. The lawsuit filed this week on behalf of Doğukan Günaydın, 28, a Turkish citizen, says two plainclothes federal officers arrested him on the street outside his St. Paul home while he was on his way to class Thursday. “Doğukan feared he was being kidnapped as a man in a hooded sweatshirt grabbed him and handcuffed him,” according to his petition.

The lawsuit partially comports with a statement issued Monday by the Department of Homeland Security that he was arrested because he had a conviction for drunken driving on his record. The federal agency said he was not detained for any political activity. His petition says Günaydın has attended no protests and has written no politically driven publications... Elected officials in Minnesota — including Gov. Tim Walz and U.S. Sens. Amy Klobuchar and Tina Smith — have been demanding an explanation from Homeland Security officials. “Snatching up students who come here legally to work hard and get an education does not make you tough on immigration,” Walz tweeted. “We need answers.”

Günaydın was in the U.S. on a student visa until the Department of Homeland Security canceled it Thursday. The petition alleges that action was illegal. It says he was held for several hours after his arrest without being told why, except that his F-1 student visa was “retroactively revoked.”  But the petition cites online records showing that his student visa wasn’t terminated until roughly seven hours after his arrest, with the only reason listed as “otherwise failing to maintain status,” citing laws that say an alien is deportable if they fail to maintain the immigration status under which they were admitted to the U.S. or whose presence in the U.S. “would have potentially adverse foreign policy consequences.” The petition says authorities have met none of those legal grounds for terminating his student visa. It says a drunken driving condition is not a legal basis, citing a DHS list of termination reasons. 
 
MORE - https://www.cnn.com/2025/04/02/us/university-of-minnesota-graduate-student-detained-ice-lawsuit/index.html




[This is just going to keep happening to people until there's a case brought before the Supreme Court, and if that Court orders that such actions are illegal. That's a big "if", with this Court.]